Evaluation
by Jinxgirl
Summary: What if Lecter had never been apprehended for his crimes...what if he were stil a psychiatrist, and Faith, while imprisoned, was evaluated by him?
1. Chapter 1

No name yet- suggestions?

Author Notes: Takes place during Faith's imprisonment. Assume that Hannibal Lecter from Silence of the Lambs had never been imprisoned and still worked as a psychiatrist… what if he were sent to speak with Faith in prison?

"Lehane? The doctor's here for you- against the wall, hands flat at sides."

Faith did as the guard had asked her as he unlocked the door to her cell, cuffing her hands quickly as he kept an eye on her legs and feet, no doubt to be aware if she used them to catch him off balance. They should know by now that she wasn't going to do anything to hurt them- unless, of course, it was in self-defense. Same with the other prisoners. If they let her be, it was five by five…but if they pulled out a shaft on her, or tried to feel her up in the shower without her express permission, they'd get more than a little hell to pay for it. Faith might be trying for redemption here, but she was hardly a martyr.

Most of the guards seemed to get that by this point, but Larry was still a little leery of her. He touched her as little as possible whenever cuffing her or frisking her, and pulled his hands away as if he thought she were diseased or something. It had bothered her at first, but five months after her arrival Faith thought she understood. The guy had seen her lift and press the maximum weight the prison gym carried without straining or even breaking a sweat more times than he probably could believe or care to remember. He had seen the toughest three prison broads after they tried to corner her in the shower her second day here, and he had seen how studiously they avoided her now, too nervous and intimidated by her to look her in the eye. All in all Faith definitely could blame the guy for being leery, but really, if he kept his hands and his comments to himself, he ought to know he'd be fine. Like any prison could hold a Slayer that didn't want to be there…

As Larry cuffed her quickly, then began to lead her with a ginger hand clamped on her shoulder down the length of the prison hall, she felt the other women watching her, no doubt speculating her temporary release. Faith had no cell mate and liked it that way- none wanted to share with her, and apparently the prison powers-that-be didn't like the idea of her sharing a cell either when she had such power and strength. Five by five by her- she'd never had a roommate and didn't want to start now.

"Please don't give him any bullshit this time, Lehane," Larry muttered under his breath as they approached a room that had become rather familiar to Faith in the past few months of her imprisonment. " You speak with him and you help your own case here, or don't you understand that?"

"I always spoke to the other ones," Faith shrugged, her voice exaggerated in its innocence. "Can't help it if they didn't like what I had to say."

"You're not going to like what we have to say if you scare off another doctor," Larry replied, though his voice was too uneasy to be very intimidating, his hand on her shoulder tightening so that Faith tensed, ill at ease with this implied threat. "Further suspension of privileges may be somewhere in there…"

"Like I have so many in this joint… what, you gonna take away my toilet paper?" Faith said wryly, quirking an eyebrow, but Larry ignored her, jaw tensing.

Faith knew exactly why he was so frustrated, and again, couldn't blame the guy. Three shrinks sent to evaluate her in as many months, and all three had reached a point where they refused to try to work with her anymore- each quicker than the last. Larry was probably getting flack for it from his superiors, even though it had nothing to do with him and everything to do with Faith. If they had any sense at all they'd just quit trying. This Lecter guy wasn't gonna be any different from all the others.

She'd never been a good one for being examined, whether physically or mentally. For the physical part, Faith didn't want people prodding her and touching her unless she touched him first and made it clear they could touch her back. And mentally? Forget it. She didn't' want to know or understand her own thoughts, let alone let some stranger poke around in her trying to understand her. As if they ever could anyway.

The only person Faith had not minded seeing inside of her- the only person she had ever let help her mentally and emotionally- was Angel. But he knew her like these people never would or could, healed her more than damaged her- or rather helped her to start to change herself. And still she had resisted it, fought every step of the way, and it was still a struggle for her to accept his caring, to actually try to fight against her own self-destructive and aggressive nature. These shrink people, all they had done was read her files- and hell if those were detailed or accurate at all. They knew nothing about her, and Faith intended to keep it that way.

When Larry opened the interview room's door and Faith saw the man sitting there, waiting for her with an odd, faint little smile, she almost laughed out loud in incredulity. THIS was the shrink they'd sent her today?! Like this guy would really get anything out of her…

He had to be at least sixty years old, probably older, and he was balding, pinkish in coloring, and not at all a large or physically threatening man. His eyes were pale, his expression benign, and yet something about the intensity of his gaze was oddly disquieting. In spite of her smugness at his physical appearance, a part of Faith wanted to look away from his eyes…for he almost looked as if, unlike all the others, he did somehow know something about her.

But that was ridiculous, of course. The guy didn't know her- no one did, not even herself hardly. It was just his stupid eyes.

Larry released her, giving her a little push towards the chair across from Dr. Lecter, and Faith slouched down in it easily, conveying with her posture how very at ease and disinterested she was with this. He glowered down at her for a moment before speaking.

"Remember what I said to you, Lehane- that wasn't just to hear myself speak."

He looked up at Dr. Lecter then, adding, "Call if you need me, Dr. I'll be here to get her in an hour, otherwise."

"I assure you that neither of us will have need of you, Larry," Dr. Lecter replied, and his eyes focused once more on Faith. "Will we, Faith?"

His voice was calm, pleasant, but totally confident without sounding pompous or arrogant. Somehow Faith couldn't recall having heard in anyone speak in the exact same tone before, let alone a psychiatrist. Weird… but still, he was just a shrink.

"Nope," she replied easily, smirking as she turned her head to quirk an eyebrow at Larry. "Don't worry, I'll call ya if I get any needs for you though…"

Larry scowled at her, although she noticed he was flushing slightly too. What, just-turned-eighteen-year-old practically jailbait didn't do it for him? Right. Couldn't be straight then. Screw that, couldn't be HUMAN.

"You'll keep comments like that to yourself when you're with Dr. Lecter if you know what's good for you, Lehane," he barked, and Faith's eyebrows rose- must have hit a nerve for mouse guy to use that kind of tone with her. "Don't forget, this is a last chance here they're giving you, and if it was up to me you wouldn't get getting it at all."

As he exited, Faith was still smirking to herself, amused; Larry was way too easy to wind up. She let her eyes drift slowly over the doctor's form, wondering what it would take to unsettle him. But the thing was that he was looking back at her with that weird little smile, making no attempt to hide his scrutiny.

"So, another shrink, huh- Lecter?" she asked nonchalantly. "You guys just don't give up, huh?"

"I am a psychiatrist, yes," Dr. Lecter replied, his eyes locked on hers. "My name is Dr. Hannibal Lecter, you are correct. And you, I assume, are Faith. May I call you Faith? Given your age and status, it seems most appropriate."

"Yeah, well, don't know what else you'd call me," she shrugged, even as inwardly she was guffawing and outwardly she couldn't resist a grin.

Hannibal- the guy's name was Hannibal?! It rhymed with cannibal! Damn, he probably got teased as a kid…

"You a carnivore, Doc?" she asked, smirking, and Lecter met her eyes calmly, though his voice had an odd firmness that threw her slightly.

"If you are in your own offhand manner mocking my first name's quality of rhyming with the word cannibal, then yes, I will tell you that I do in fact eat meat of all varieties, and I do not possess any sense of shame for it. As for your addressal of me as "Doc," I will inform you, Faith, that this will end now. You will call me Dr. Lecter, or you will not address me at all."

Normally Faith would sneer at such a request from a shrink and continue on the way she'd been planning, but something about the way this guy looked and spoke stopped her… it had not been a request. And had he been implying what she thought he was when he said he ate ALL varieties of meat?

Surely not. He was bullshitting her.

"Whatever," she shrugged, blanking out her expression deliberately.

"I will take that as acquiescence on your behalf," Dr. Lecter responded smoothly, and Faith frowned, looking at him with more than a little suspicion now.

What did acquiescence even mean? She'd just gotten here, and already she didn't like this guy. It felt different with him somehow… somehow, unlike with the others, she didn't quite feel that she had total control…


	2. Chapter 2

"So, Faith Lehane… Lehane is Irish, yes? You do not physically appear to carry Irish characteristics… but I would expect your would find such tendencies in your behavior," Lecter commented wryly, and Faith stiffened.

Was he mocking her? He was acting like he already knew her… what did he mean, saying she had Irish tendencies? Was he implying that she was a drunk, uneducated hothead?

"What's that supposed to mean?" she asked tautly, but Lecter politely ignored both tone and question, still regarding her almost pleasantly.

"And Faith… usually a name chosen by parents of religious faith, particularly of a Catholic background. But your parents were not actively religious, were they, Faith?"

"No," Faith replied with a shrug, somewhat relieved; so this was where all that was leading. The guy was going to try to ease into the nitty-gritty details of her screwy childhood… whatever, she could deal with that, deflect it, now that she knew where it was going.

"Nah, expect they were going for the irony on that one."

"Is that so?" Lecter replied, and his voice was soft, even, his gaze unwavering. Something about it was almost hypnotic, compelling… even as it unsettled Faith, a part of her didn't want to look away.

"What do you mean by saying that, Faith?" Lecter continued, and Faith ripped her eyes away from his, her heart beating rapidly quite suddenly. She kept her eyes deliberately averted as she replied to him roughly.

"Look, I know what you're going for here, DOC," she spat, deliberately using the nickname not only to show her contempt for him, but also to prove to herself that she wasn't intimidated too. "You're trying to get me to spill my guts over having a bad childhood and get me moaning and crying over how my mama didn't love me enough made me do all the big bad evil things I did the past couple of years. Well screw that, there's nothing to tell, and I'm not saying it anyway. I was born, I grew up. End of story."

"Did you really?" Lecter remarked mildly, seeming unmoved entirely by her roughness, by her use of the nickname he had explicitly warned her not to use. "Grow up, that is…"

Faith's face flushed slightly, from both anger and embarrassment; how the hell had she managed to walk into that one? She had to give the old guy credit- he was slicker than she would have thought.

"Okay, I'll give you that one, smartass," she muttered. "But that's all you're gonna get… from this point on, you're just wasting your time…" she let herself smirk, raising her eyebrows and deliberately stretching as much as her cuffed hands would allow. "That is, unless you just like the view."

All the other psychiatrists, in Faith's previous experiences- actually, most older adults in positions of authority over her- would definitely be flustered by such an implication on her part. But Lecter just continued to regard her without expression changing… if anything, he was showing a hint of a smirk as well.

"I assure you, Faith, that I am quite uninterested in your 'charms,'" he said dryly, obvious sarcastic emphasis on the last word. "I have nothing but disdain and contempt for those controlled by their sexual inclinations, and beyond that, a girl such as yourself would not in the least interest me."

"Well, guess your 'sexual inclination' isn't straight then, huh?" Faith shot back as she allowed her posture to relax to its previous carefully uncaring position.

She did her best not to show it on her face, but she actually was a little stung by Lecter's wry response and seeming total lack of response to her sexually. Could he really not find her attractive? And why the hell did she care?

"You mean 'orientation,' Faith, not 'inclination,'" Lecter corrected; she heard the amusement in his voice and bristled. Seeing this, he smiled. "You have no reason to be insulted. You are an attractive girl to most, I am sure. You are simply not one that I would find sufficiently suitable to my sexual desires."

"Oh yeah?" Faith couldn't resist, her eyebrows shooting up even higher. "Might I ask who would be?"

"No," Lecter replied affably, his faint smile not fading at the open hostility in her voice, and Faith wondered how it was that she was being drawn into this- how the hell had it happened?

"Faith, it does not escape me that you are avoiding speaking to me about yourself," Lecter continued, his eyes still locked on hers. "You are trying to deter my attention away from you upon yourself. This will not be successful. I am here to talk about you. Because you seem so reluctant to do so, I will allow you now to decide where you would like to start. What would you like to talk to me about in regards to your life?"

"Well, that's pretty easy," Faith replied quickly, confidence alight in her tone now- she was relieved to have an answer, a way out of this at last. "There's nothing at all I want to talk to you about. Makes your job easier, huh? So why don't we just sit here and do our thing- you get paid, I get outta my cell a while, we both win. Sounds like a plan to me."

"I don't believe that, Faith," Lecter replied so firmly that Faith's irritation was equaled by unease. "You do wish to talk with someone… you wish to talk with me, whether you allow yourself to acknowledge it or not…you wish to do so desperately. But you will not… you cannot allow yourself to, because you are afraid," he said softly, intently, his pale eyes bearing across the table into hers. "You are afraid of what you would say, how it might make you feel… but mostly, you are afraid that if you should attempt to speak, to share yourself, that you would discover that there is no one around you, no one on all this earth, who would care enough to listen."

At those softly spoken words, Faith froze, for a moment unable to look away from that penetrating gaze as her mind raced, defensive, rattled. Finally, her voice a little louder, a little less even and more defensive than she had intended, she shot back, "Oh yeah? That's what you think, DOC? You don't know shit about me- you don't know shit about anything!"

"No?" Lecter threw back at her, his voice growing quieter still, but there was an edge to his tone, steel to his voice and eyes as he replied. "I would first like to remind you, Faith, that I have made it quite clear to you that you are to refrain from addressing me as anything other than Dr. Lecter. And I would then counter your statement by asserting that I do in fact think I know you. I believe, in fact, that I know you better than yourself."

"So you read my files and that makes you know me?" Faith laughed, but there was no humor in the sound. She rolled her eyes, as much for her own benefit as for Lecter's. "First off, they don't tell you shit about ME, they tell you everything I did to make me a bad girl whose gotta cool her heels behind bars, and listen to pricks like you try to play doctor with my head 'cause they're too scared to do it with my body. Like I said, you don't know shit."

"Do you care to test that theory?" Lecter leveled, his tone and expression unchanged by the mocking of Faith's word, and she set her jaw, not liking his continued cool confidence, the fact that she still had not shaken him in the slightest. He was still watching her, almost unblinking, and Faith felt more restless and discomfited than ever, barely resisting her urge to squirm and look away from him.

"The files told me some facts about you, yes…but simply being in this room with you tells me so much more, more than you could possibly be aware of," Lecter almost purred, his voice a low, nearly velvety cadence that Faith inwardly writhed at. "Your posture, your facial expressions, the way you shift your weight and move your hands even while cuffed… and let us not forget your eyes. Your eyes are truly the windows to your soul, Faith… and whether or not you realize it, and I believe that you do not, your eyes are more transparent than most."

"You think you're some kinda mind reader?" Faith said quickly, staying on the defensive, aware of the tautness of her muscles even more strongly now. "I know you don't know nothing you didn't read or someone didn't tell you, that's bullshit. You just want me to tell you what's what to prove how wrong you are. I might not be a rocket scientist, but I'm not stupid either. You're not gonna get me to tell you nothing."

"No?" Lecter asked, and there was not even a hint of surprise in his tone. "Then I'll have to tell you."

He leaned in toward her, his eyes slightly narrowed, yet still fixated unwaveringly on hers… his voice lowered, soft, but intense, and Faith couldn't help but listen, couldn't help but allow him to continue. She didn't understand why this was, why she couldn't tune him out, be indifferent to him as to everyone else… but for some reason, she simply couldn't. She couldn't make herself do it.

"What you are, Faith, is a child… in every possible sense of the word. Impulsive, mentally and emotionally underdeveloped, your desires and needs overruling any more logical part of you… you may look and behave like a woman, an experienced, unflappable veteran of life and the ways of this world, but it's all a mask of what you truly are inside."

His voice lowered further still, but Faith caught every word, could almost physically feel them burning into her brain.

"You are nothing more than a little girl in all reality, Faith…a desperate, terrified small child who was never loved by her mother, and who was loved too enthusiastically by her mother's string of male visitors. You look now for someone to give you that perfect and unconditional love you never had, the love you need so very intensely in order to feel that you and your life has value…but you haven't found that love, have you? No one is willing to give it to you..perhaps no one alive is even capable of it. And so you became angry… you lashed out at the world, hurting because you hurt, hating because you have no love… all that toughness and independence you make sure to display, all that nonchalance, it may be real in part… but it's also a cover, isn't it, Faith? It overrides the greater truth of who and what you are. Frightened…needy… and weak."

Faith froze; for several moments she was unable to speak, unable to even think in any logical manner. She was dimly aware of the dryness in her mouth, the constriction in her throat, and the pounding unevenness of her heartbeat, and she could not yet even experience a sense of disgust at them. She could barely wrap her mind around Lecter's words enough to make sense of them, let alone to deny them. And she had to deny them…they couldn't be true, he was wrong, very fuckin' wrong-

Only he wasn't… a soft, nonetheless firm voice somewhere inside told her that he wasn't. Still she fought against it, fiercely protesting.

"That's bullshit," she said at last, her voice hoarse, but she was gratified that it did not shake. "You're a fuckin' liar…"

"Not at all, Faith, and you don't believe your words," Lecter interrupted calmly but assuredly, and he went so far as to smile at her faintly. "You know very well that I am speaking the truth…don't you?"

She swallowed, her eyes darting away; she wanted nothing more than to get up and leave, to call for Larry to come and take her back to her cell, take her away from this man who knew too damn much and had not the slightest qualm about saying it. She couldn't though, and she knew it. That would make her look like she believed him…it would make her look like she couldn't handle what he was saying to her. And worse of all it would make her look weak. No way was Faith Lehane going to look weak in front of this bastard.


	3. Chapter 3

Preview:

"That's bullshit," she said at last, her voice hoarse, but she was gratified that it did not shake. "You're a fuckin' liar…"

"Not at all, Faith, and you don't believe your words," Lecter interrupted calmly but assuredly, and he went so far as to smile at her faintly. "You know very well that I am speaking the truth…don't you?"

She swallowed, her eyes darting away; she wanted nothing more than to get up and leave, to call for Larry to come and take her back to her cell, take her away from this man who knew too damn much and had not the slightest qualm about saying it. She couldn't though, and she knew it. That would make her look like she believed him…it would make her look like she couldn't handle what he was saying to her. And worse of all it would make her look weak. No way was Faith Lehane going to look weak in front of this bastard.

Part three

"I don't know shit, and neither do you," she spat, but Lecter simply raised an eyebrow shifting his eyes to her arm, or more specifically her tattoo, in the short-sleeved prison shirt, changing the topic in what seemed a very abrupt manner to her.

"Interesting design you have there… was this the work of another prisoner?"

"What the hell do you care?" she asked tightly, but Lecter just smiled.

"I would wager not, it is too skillfully done… rather interesting, as I said before. Particularly the number 96 in its center… any specific significance to that number?"

Faith stiffened again, jaw tightening; no way was she saying a word to him. Still those probing eyes were focused on her… and still he continued to speak quietly, his every word upping her torment.

"You are eighteen, yes…and you were born in December of 1982. This would make you around thirteen years old in 1996…. Correct?" He pressed on ruthlessly, and Faith's lips thinned out even further, teeth gritting. "Am I wrong in my recollection that this was the year that your mother fatally overdosed?"

I'm not saying a word, I'm not saying a word… he can't make me, I'm not saying a fucking word…

"I can imagine that the year of 1996 was an important, if traumatic, one for you in your life," Lecter continued smoothly, and though Faith refused to look at him, she was all too aware of his eyes studying her. "I suppose it was a year that changed everything for you. With your mother's death, you had nowhere to go, did you…even that extraordinarily unstable and un-preferable environment, that small sense of security, was taken away. It had been bad for you, when she was alive… but it was worse for you when she was dead, wasn't it? So you left, didn't you…but it was months before you were placed in a juvenile center, before your foster mother came to claim you into her care. What happened before she came for you, Faith? When there was no one there for you but you…how did you survive?"

"Fuck you!" Faith snapped, no longer able to hold back, to hide that Lecter was affecting her. She could feel herself shaking slightly and deliberately tensed her muscles, trying to gain control. Lecter was unmoved, as always; if anything, his eyes glimmered with amusement.

"Interesting choice of words, Faith… Freud would have been quite intrigued."

"I'm not fuckin' talkin' to you!" Faith almost yelled, even as her face flushed hotly. "I'm not talkin' to you, you can't make me say nothin'-"

"You may not tell me anything verbally, Faith, but I can see the answers all the same," Lecter replied coolly, and Faith could form no reply for that.

Her thoughts were fragmented, nonsensical, and she felt violated, though he had never touched her, never raised his voice or showed anything but calm. It was that confidence, all that damn cocky amusement and certainty that got to her… not to mention that he was right. How did he know all this… it couldn't' all have been in her files. Who had he been talking to? Who would know? Not Angel, even Angel wouldn't know, and he would never… how the hell did Lecter KNOW?!

"Your foster mother took you in- Diana, wasn't that her name?" Lecter continued, as Faith sat with emotions running rampant, stilling her. "She cared for you, didn't' she, Faith? She cared about you as no one had before…and she was murdered. You were enraged, I'm sure, over the brutality of it, the injustice…but moreover, I suspect you felt fear. The helpless, childlike fear of a girl once more entirely alone in the world… so you left, didn't you? You came to Sunnydale… crossing the entire country to get there. Why? What would make you do such a thing… what was there in Sunnydale that drove you so strongly?"

"Nothin'!" Faith snapped fiercely, even as a small-featured face framed by blonde hair quickly flashed through her mind. "Shut the hell up, you don't know nothin', there was NOTHIN'!"

Normally she would have been able to play it off much more coolly than that…normally she would never have been reduced to such a state. But there was nothing normal about this examination, if that was what it was…and there was nothing normal about the man before her. Somehow Faith had lost all control of the situation, and a part of her wondered if she had ever even had it in the first place…

"I don't think so…I think it was everything," Lecter countered. "The only thing I do not quite understand is just what it was that you were seeking out here… what it was that would so call you. Or maybe… who it was."

Faith said nothing, fighting off the visualization coming to her mind. Her jaw was starting to ache from grinding her teeth, and her heart was pounding so fast she was sure Lecter must have been able to hear it… could he hear her thoughts too? Did he know she was a Slayer- did he know about B? No one in the prison staff did that she knew of- but then how-

"I know of the group of young people you associated yourself with, though I admit your files left details of this much to be desired," Lecter continued, watching her closely. "Though names are not mentioned, they are hardly necessary-"

"If you already know everything, then I don't need to tell you," Faith cut him off sharply. "If you know everything, why are you sitting here recounting it all?"

"You killed two men, Faith," Lecter replied, ignoring her words, instead continuing on with his line of addressal. "But it has been noted as well that someone tried to kill you. You were stabbed, found in the back of a truck with injuries that implied you had fallen a great distance… wounds severe enough to rend you into an eight month coma. Who did that to you, Faith… who did you let get so close to you?"

His eyes on her were all she could feel, all she could see… blood rushed to her head, roared in her ears, and Faith exploded. She banged her cuffed hands , formed into tight fists, on the table, hard and loudly enough for most people to jump- but Dr. Hannibal Lecter, as she had already ascertained, was not most people. As she stood with abrupt, jerky aggression in her movements, leaning toward him as she stood over him in a clearly physically threatening manner, Lecter didn't' so much as blink an eye.

"FUCK YOU! Who the fuck are you, how do you fuckin' know this shit- who the hell are you to say it, you fuckin' liar!" she yelled, her speech roughening, her voice also serving as a form of physical assault to him on its own as she glared at him, almost shaking with rage mingled with less focused, less desirable emotions. "Who have you been talkin' to- you don't know shit, this is total bullshit!"

"You are emotional," Lecter remarked detachedly, looking right back at into her face with something almost akin to pleasure. "You are afraid… why is that, Faith? Are you reacting in such a manner because you are so accustomed to lies and denials that the truth spoken aloud by another alarms you?"

"This is bullshit!" she raged, and yet she felt almost helpless, as if she were a child being politely ignored while in the midst of a tantrum. "This is fuckin' bullshit-"

"Who was it, Faith?" Lecter repeated calmly, but with enough intensity to effectively drown out her outburst. "Who hurt you, after all the hurt you inflicted upon others… who finally gave it back to you?"

"I'm not tellin' you shit!" Faith cried, smacking her hands against the table again hard enough that she felt the wood crack beneath her touch. She knew that if she chose to, she could break the handcuffs binding her wrist… hell, even without her hands free, she could easily find a way to hurt Lecter, even to kill him. But even in her rage and pain, a small but strong part of her- a part that had grown much stronger in the past few months of struggling for redemption- held her back. She couldn't hurt him… he was not physically attacking her. She'd go to solitary, maybe total lockdown, who knows for how long… of course, she could escape, but even in this mindset she knew she wouldn't- she couldn't. She had struggled too long for too little to let go now.

But damn she wanted to kill him.

"I'm not tellin' you nothin', you bastard, I'm not talkin' about anything! I'm not talkin' about her!" she hissed- and too late realized her mistake. Not only had she confirmed the gender of the person in question- and who knows how much he knew, if he had already known this or not- but she had also confirmed that he was right, that such a person existed… and that they had indeed stabbed her.

Oh shit… idiot, fuckin' stupid…

"But you just did talk about it," Lecter said softly, but no less triumphantly, his eyes on hers so piercingly that Faith jerked her head to the side, aware that she was breathing faster than usual. "You just spoke about her… who was she, Faith? What was she to you? Was she one of the girls you associated yourself with for a time?"

Faith pressed her lips tightly together, barely able to keep herself from lashing out… or maybe from breaking down. The ambiguity of her own feelings horrified her, and she remained rigid as Lecter continued.

"What was she to you, Faith… a friend? A partner in crime… a lover?"

A muscle in her face twitched at his last mentioning, and Lecter nodded as if he had expected no less.

"I see… you loved her, didn't you, Faith?" he said, his voice smooth, not quite gentle. "You loved her, and she stabbed you… she desired your death, and she undertook means necessary to claim it. She didn't love you, did she… no one ever has, have they?"

His voice lowered, and all Faith could see, all she could focus on, was his eyes bearing into hers…

"Tell me, Faith," he spoke softly, the pale blue of his irises dimly reminding her of a ghost, or maybe a vulture. "Do you still carry the scar?"

His voice implied that he meant much more than physically, and Faith understood and was shaken by this. Unconsciously her cuffed hands lifted, covering the healed-over, yet still markedly present, evidence on her abdomen. She did not reply, could not gather enough coherence or fire in her thoughts to answer in a satisfying manner, and Lecter smiled slightly. His eyes drifted deliberately to her hands, taking in their positioning before moving back to her face, and he spoke in the same measured, nearly intimate tone.

"Some wounds never fade away, do they, Faith? Especially when one simply attempts to will away their existence… sometimes, ignoring one's wounds can only make them worse, doesn't it?"

"Shut up," Faith ground out, her eyes hardening deliberately, her every muscle pulled into tension and angry anxiety. Her brows were furrowed deeply, and her voice was rough as she stared fiercely at Lecter- but considerably below eye level. "Shut up, you don't know SHIT…"

"Repeating those words does not make them so, Faith," Lecter replied mildly, "nor do they weaken their effect on you. You pride yourself on your physical strength, I am told… but what of your emotional and mental strength? Can you take the truth of your being and face it, do something to make it more to your satisfaction? Can you even stand to hear about it? Or will you buckle under to it, give into it… remain the needy child I see before me now?"

"I will NEVER give in to you, you bastard," Faith spat, her features tightening even further, even as her stomach twisted itself painfully and her heart pounded hard against her ribcage.

If she had expected Lecter to be disappointed by this proclamation, she was to be disappointed herself. He simply nodded slightly, the corners of his thin lips turning up just a fraction.

"I am delighted to hear that, Faith," he said dryly, though there was not delight at all in his tone so much as quiet amusement. "But it's not really me whom you're fighting so fiercely against… is it? The person you are really so earnestly battling is yourself…"

Faith stared, her thoughts overlapping, not quite linear in their order as she struggled against anger, instinctive defensiveness, a desire to carry out violence and vengeance… and also grief and deeply rooted anxiety. For she could never say so aloud, could not admit it even to herself…but what Lecter was saying, his entire harsh evaluation of her, was not inaccurate.

She was working up a response when a knock sounded at the door behind her, causing her to jump slightly. Lecter lifted his eyes to regard the door calmly again, unrattled, and Faith wondered bitterly if it was even possible to rattle him.

"Come in," he called out, and Larry entered the room once more, looking from Faith to Lecter warily.

"I've come to bring her back," he said, still eyeing the two at the table, obviously trying to assess what had happened. "That is if you're finished, Dr. Lecter…"

"Certainly, Larry," Lecter replied, his eyes lifting to regard him with a pleasant smile that nevertheless did not hide the satisfaction in his eyes. "We're quite finished now…I believe we made quite a bit of headway today, didn't we, Faith?"

"Fuck you," Faith hissed- she could think of no other reply. She could feel herself shaking slightly, and as much as she hated this- as much as she tried to will herself and her body to stop- she couldn't quite control it. Her hands formed fists as Larry came to take her by the arm, pulling her up to her feet again. For a moment she wondered dimly at what point she had sat down, and why she couldn't remember it.

Lecter nodded to her genially, and his voice was unfailingly courteous as he addressed her.

"It was a pleasure to meet you, Faith. I trust that we will have much more to discuss when I see you a month from now…until that anticipated time, I am certain that you will think over our talk often."

There was a faint undertone to his words, an almost threatening quality, that only further antagonized her. But as it was, Larry was already leading her away, and even his barely adequate hold of her was enough to make her restrain herself from any physical reaction

This was what she told herself… but even as Larry led her away, Faith was all too aware of the unevenness of her breathing, the sick, shaky feeling in her chest…and the hotness behind her eyes, the feeling of her complete lack of control. Even as she walked away, she was all too aware that was she not quite leaving Dr. Hannibal Lecter and his words to her behind.

end


End file.
